We have become very dull.
We sat in bed with our coffee this morning earnestly discussing our preferred sort of camper van doormat.
We have not yet got a carpet in the camper van. That is not exactly true, we have got a carpet, it is a horrid cream offcut affair that Mark found in a skip. It is a Temporary Carpet until we have finished trampling mud and glue and other by-products of building work in and out of the van. Once we have finished doing things then we will teach the dogs how to wipe their feet and lay the beautiful new grey carpet that we have got carefully stored away in a dry corner of the shed.
Once the lovely soft grey carpet is on the floor, walking on it with muddy boots or paws is likely to become a capital offence. This will mean that we have got no family left very quickly, and so we are trying to create a foot-and-paw wiping space which will mean that as little mud as possible finishes up encrusted into the beautiful carpet.
Hence the detailed conversation about doormats, including details about size, positioning, and whether they should be glued to the floor as a permanent fixture. Do we want coir or rubber? and should we also put one on the outside step?
To any young people reading this, there will come a time in your life when you think that things like this are interesting. You will find yourself in bed beside the man of your dreams, and you will sit there thoughtfully considering doormats.
We all thought that it wouldn’t happen to us.
The other topic under discussion was our next excursion in the van, which will be on Thursday. This is because the children, who have only been at school for half an hour, come home for exeat on Friday.
We are going to go across on Thursday. We had actually been invited to attend Lucy’s school on Thursday evening, for an event called Curry And Quiz Night, but Mark vetoed this firmly. He pointed out that we would be no good whatsoever at a quiz and would finish up embarrassing ourselves in front of an awful lot of wealthy successful people.
We considered this, and had a quick trivia experiment.
I could not name a single footballer, since I found out that Gary Barlow is not one, and Mark knew Kevin Keegan. We don’t know anything at all about music, when we are in the camper van we listen to George Gershwin and Scott Joplin, and at home we don’t bother because it irritates me. We don’t know a single thing about television, could not name any actors apart from Helen Mirren and Judi Dench, and although Mark thought he could probably do brilliantly well at any questions about Landrover maintenance, we thought that there might not be many of those.
I couldn’t think of anything much that I knew anything about. I have comfortably forgotten most of my fairly comprehensive education, and if that has left a vacant space in my memory banks, I have not filled it with anything else.
Also curry gives Mark wind.
It was settled, then, we would not be going to Lucy’s school. Instead we will be camping in a lay by somewhere.
This means that we will need the bathroom and the heater.
It was Saturday, and so we should not have gone to the farm, but we couldn’t resist. We tidied up hastily and dashed across, and Mark cut some more lino and varnished the woodwork, and I painted some more of the bathroom door, which is above.
I know that the sea is floating in mid air. This is because I haven’t finished yet. I don’t suppose anybody said to Constable ‘there’s no wheels on that cart’ when he was still halfway through. You will have to be patient whilst I add appropriate scenery and vegetation into the gap in the middle.
We couldn’t stay long. We went home for a little sleep and then off to work, in order to carry on funding it all for another day.
I am sitting on the taxi rank contemplating my lawless door.
I will have to hurry up. We are going away on Thursday and I need a bathroom door.
I might just make the sea bigger.
